


Friendly Infections

by darth_healer



Category: Naruto
Genre: Awkward Romance, F/M, Slow Burn, Slow Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2020-07-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:07:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 21,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24808996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darth_healer/pseuds/darth_healer
Summary: *REVAMPED*A pandemic is sweeping Konoha and Sakura is tapped dry. Her only choice is to work with Kabuto to find a cure. He may be insufferable, but Sakura is no stranger to suffering. In fact, she might be more masochistic than she thought.*This story was re-written to reflect a more consistent romance between Sakura and Kabuto. I took all your reviews to heart and have tried to make something that you will all enjoy. Much of it remains the same as what I posted a few years ago, it is mostly in the later half of the story that I made big changes.
Relationships: Haruno Sakura/Yakushi Kabuto
Comments: 11
Kudos: 34





	1. Chapter 1

The air was hot and humid on top of the Hokage tower. Even the gentle breeze served only to whip dry dust into Sakura’s mouth and eyes as she gazed at the village below. Sakura wasn’t usually one for heights. She wasn’t afraid, per se, but she was more unsettled than most shinobi would be.

The thing about this height was that there was no disease up here. There was no infection waiting to be caught, no germs floating around that would carry illness into Sakura’s heart and lungs. No, the top of the Hokage tower was a safe place – the only safe place in Konoha now.

The other thing about this height was that it allowed her to map out the village with a bird’s eye view. She could draw the lines from where the illness originated, where it was the worst, where most people were still able to carry on with their daily lives until the disease eventually swept over them, too.

It had been one month since the outbreak, one month since Ino had come back from her routine escort mission, delirious with fever and vomiting everywhere.

Ino wasn’t the type to allow herself to get sick. She was trained in medical ninjutsu. She was smart and capable.

Which meant that this disease was something to be reckoned with. If it had claimed a shinobi – one trained to handle such things – then what hope did the rest of Konoha have?

Sakura knew what hope they had because unfortunately, it was her. Even Tsunade had fallen ill, despite her best efforts to prevent the disease from spreading through the administrative wing of the Hokage tower. Quarantine hadn’t stopped the infection from spreading. No amount of cleaning, scrubbing, or disinfecting had prevented anyone from falling ill.

No, the only person in Konoha who had somehow managed to stay healthy enough to at least get up and walk around was Sakura.

This was not, of course, due to some divine quality that gave Sakura immunity. No, it was a constant struggle. She could feel the infection in her blood, sense it attacking her cells at every moment. She was infected the same as everyone else. She was contagious like everyone else.

But Sakura wasn’t an average medic. She possessed perfect chakra control and a thorough knowledge of the human body – especially her own. So every morning, she woke up early to clear the infection within her body. She destroyed the bacteria, the little demons inside her that were constantly willing her to keel over, to vomit, to faint. She expended half of her chakra every morning just to be able to keep herself free from infection.

And then she spent the other half of her chakra, doing her best to help the others who were infected.

This worked for a short time. It worked before literally every person in Konoha had become ill. She could rid a body of the infection, sure. She wasn’t an amateur. The problem was it came back. Everyday, no matter what she did, her infection and everyone else’s came right back like it had never been gone.

It was fruitless to spend her time trying to heal everyone only for them to become sick again the next day, so now, today, at the one month mark, Sakura had officially given up. She was out of ideas. The only good thing they seemed to have going now was that the disease didn’t seem to be fatal. No one had died yet of the illness, and no one’s condition seemed to worsen past a certain point.

Sakura found comfort in this as she sketched a quick map of the village into her notepad. At least no one had died.

Her only logical next step would be to trace the origin of the disease. Ino had gotten sick on a mission, which meant there could potentially be sick people all over Fire Country. Sakura needed to know where it had come from in order to start researching a viable cure.

This was the kind of thing Tsunade would have sent Team 8 out to do. But Team 8 wasn’t available. No team, no shinobi was available. Just Sakura.

“I need some help,” Sakura muttered to herself. She didn’t even know where to start.

She snapped her notebook shut and squinted her eyes against the blinding light of the sunset, peering off to the horizon. She tucked her notebook into her pack with a sigh. She could see the moon high up in the sky, cheeky and dim while the sun still cast it’s orange glow over the world. It made her think of Sasuke for some reason. The moon had always reminded her of him.

She wondered now if Sasuke was sick. It had been almost two years since he had left Konoha. Perhaps he was safe down in Kabuto’s bunker, down where the only other medical nin who had the skills to tackle such a disease was presumably safe and infection free.

Sakura blinked as the first inkling of an idea began forming itself. Kabuto was a medic, too. Perhaps this disease had been his doing. Or perhaps he knew enough about it to be able to help Sakura.

Surely if this infection had reached Konoha, it must have reached other corners of Fire Country as well. Kabuto had to know about it. He probably had his own antidote, his own cure tucked away somewhere to give to Orochimaru if he needed it. Perhaps he had one for Sasuke and himself as well.

Feeling determined, Sakura set her mouth in a hard line and made for Tsunade’s quarters.

///

“No. Absolutely not.”

Sakura tapped her foot impatiently, watching her shishou’s pale face frowned up at her from beneath the fold of her white bedsheet.

“But Kabuto is the only other person who would know anything about this,” Sakura argued. “At the very least, we could work on a cure for this together.”

“I’m not letting you go cavort with Orochimaru’s lackey,” Tsunade persisted. “It’s dangerous. And he’s a fucking prick.”

“Kabuto or Orochimaru?”

“Both!”

“Well, I don’t see what other option we have,” Sakura said. “There isn’t anything else I can do. I need to research the origin, at least, which would still take me away from the village for an undetermined length of time.”

“You can’t leave, Sakura,” Tsunade said. “You’re the only thing holding the village together right now.”

Sakura frowned, hoping with all her might that that wasn’t true. She couldn’t handle that kind of pressure. Not on top of dealing with the infection. Not while all her friends and family were too sick to offer any help. Not while her teammate was still missing.

“What should I do then, Tsunade-shishou?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper. “I don’t know what to do.”

Tsunade shifted in her bed, working her way up to a sitting position Sakura leaned forward to steady her as she leaned back against her headboard. Sakura reached over for a damp cloth to wipe the sweat from Tsunade’s brow.

“Send word to Suna,” she suggested. “Ask Gaara for help.”

“But what if we just end up sending the infection to Suna?” Sakura asked. “Even if the message gets delivered, how could Gaara help? Remember, they needed our help when his brother was sick. How could they help now?”

“We’re in a vulnerable position,” Tsunade explained. “They might not be able to help us find a cure, but we will need Suna’s protection if the other nations find out what state we’re in. So send a message to Gaara letting him know about this situation.”

With a resigned sigh, Sakura nodded.

“Sakura, I’m so proud of you,” Tsunade said. “I know this isn’t an ideal situation, but you’re handing this pressure remarkably well. You’d make a good Hokage.”

Sakura let out an abrupt laugh. That was the last thing she wanted.

“I know, I know,” Tsunade continued. “Believe me, I completely understand what you’re feeling. Even if you don’t want it, you would be well suited for it.”

“Thanks, shishou.”

“Go on. Go send out Gaara’s message and then go home and get some rest,” Tsunade said. “We’ll figure everything else out later.”

Sakura wanted to believe that was true, but she couldn’t quell the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach as she shut Tsunade’s door.

///

Sakura sat with her head propped up on one arm, scribbling furiously on a piece of parchment before ripping said parchment with even more ferocity. How was she supposed to tactfully tell the Kazekage that Konoha was in shambles, that everyone here was bedridden and completely vulnerable to any sort of attack? Not only was it embarrassing, but she was certain it would give Suna a smug sense of superiority over them that they did not deserve.

This could have happened anywhere. It could have been Suna plagued with this disease. But, as if the poor citizens of Konoha hadn’t had enough to deal with between the cursed Uchiha family and the prodigal son-of-the-Fourth jinchuuriki, it was her home that was stricken by tragedy once again.

With a frustrated groan, Sakura dropped her head and let it fall against her desk with a loud thump. She needed to find at least the bare minimum of words necessary to explain this situation to Gaara because Tsunade was absolutely right. Sakura couldn’t leave Konoha without knowing they were being watched over in some sort of way.

Begrudgingly, she picked up her pen again and in her loopy, girlish scrawl, she explained as best she could how dire things really were here in Konoha. When she had finished, she tied the roll of parchment to a messenger hawk and sent it on its way. She watched its wings flap starkly against the bright sky, waiting until it was a mere speck before she turned back to her office.

Well, Tsunade’s office. Since her shishou had become bedridden, Sakura had taken it upon herself to set up her things in Tsunade’s office. It was easier since everything she needed to temporarily wield the title of Hokage was in there, but it felt strange all the same to have assumed her teacher’s place.

A gentle knock at the door surprised her, jolting her into an upright position. There was only one person who had the fortitude to be walking about right now.

“Sakura-chan, are you hungry? I brought you some ramen.”

Sakura looked at the doorway and saw Naruto leaning against the frame with a cup of instant noodles in one hand and a peach in the other. He looked unnaturally pale and his skin bore the same sheen of sweat that every other person in Konoha’s had. Somehow there was still a fierceness in his eyes, a determination to make things right. It managed to surface between his bouts of vomiting and sleeping, proving that only Naruto could cling to that Will of Fire through severe illness.

“Naruto, you should be resting,” Sakura said wearily, though she was secretly glad for his company.

“So should you,” he countered. “Come on, you at least need to eat something.” He approached the desk and set down the noodles and the peach, watching her expectantly.

Sakura made no move for the food – she wasn’t hungry, though the more sensible part of her knew she should eat. Instead, she leaned back in her shishou’s chair and let out a miserable sigh. She was sure Naruto could sense the sourness of her mood, but it had always been his prerogative to cheer her up rather than wallow in misery with her. He pulled up the chair in front of the desk and scooted it up beside her, sitting on it backwards, spreading his legs on either side of its wooden back.

“Who was that message for?” he asked.

“Gaara-sama,” she answered. “We’re pretty vulnerable right now so Tsunade-sama thought it was best we informed him of the situation.”

“Do you think he’ll be able to help?”

She scowled. “No, I don’t,” she snapped. “There isn’t anything he could do that I’m not already doing. The best he could do is send up extra hands, which will only get sick if they enter the gates. What we really need to do is look for patient zero. Or do some investigative digging into the disease’s origin. Nothing’s going to get better while we’re sitting around doing nothing.”

“I could do that,” Naruto suggested. Sakura gave him a dry look. “I’m serious!” he said defensively. “I could try to track down patient zero. Tell me what to do and I’ll do it, Sakura-chan. Do you need me to hunt someone down? Is there some kind of—”

Sakura picked up the peach from her desk and shoved it into Naruto’s flapping mouth. “There’s nothing you can do, Naruto,” she said. “You’re too sick. You shouldn’t even be here right now. You should be in bed.”

Naruto took a bite of the peach, unperturbed by her spurt of violence. “You said yourself nothing’s going to get better while we sit here and do nothing,” he said as he chewed. “I know I’m not exactly at my peak right now, but I swear I’ll do whatever it takes to help you figure this out.”

Sucking in a deep, annoyed breath, Sakura appraised her blonde teammate, catching the ever-present determination in his eyes. He was stubborn to a fault, which usually served only to grate on her nerves. But today, Sakura was desperate, and she knew that in spite of his bumbling idiocy, she would always be able to rely on him.

“Okay, I do have one idea,” she began. Naruto shifted eagerly in his chair, his ears perked.

“Tell me!”

“I think Kabuto might be able to help us.”

“Kabuto?” Naruto screeched. “What the hell would we need that bastard’s help for? He betrayed us! He’s working with Orochimaru!”

“I know, Naruto,” she replied calmly, “but he’s a medic-nin, too, and he has more experience than I do when it comes to stuff like this. He’s probably already got some kind of cure for this disease. He’s probably had to give it to Sasuke-kun already. You know Orochimaru won’t want his vessel compromised.”

The tight clench of Naruto’s jaw told her that he wasn’t exactly pleased with her idea. She watched his pupils dilate slightly and the whiskers on his face twitch as he tried to reign in his temper.

“Even if he doesn’t have a cure, he might be able to help us find one,” Sakura asserted. “Don’t you agree?”

Naruto shook his head. “What makes you think he’ll help us?” he demanded. “He doesn’t care about anything but serving Orochimaru.”

Sakura crossed her arms and leaned back away from him. With a bit more force than necessary, she tore the lid off the cup of noodles and began taking angry bites. “I don’t see you coming up with any better ideas,” she said through a mouthful of noodles.

“I’ve got a bad feeling about this, Sakura-chan. Have you asked Tsunade-sama about this?” he asked.

“She doesn’t like the idea any more than you do,” Sakura replied, giving him a sideways glance. “She says it’s dangerous—”

“It is,” Naruto interjected.

“—but it’s the only option we have.”

Naruto pressed his lips together, the expression on his face for once reflecting the seriousness of the situation. He may not have always been wise enough to avoid danger for his own sake, but Sakura could see by the set of his jaw and the way his shoulders were squared toward her that he did not intend to let her do anything to put herself at risk.

“Is it really the only option, Sakura-chan?”

Sakura set down the cup of noodles and chewed her lip while she mulled it over. Ideally she could find a cure on her own, without Kabuto’s help. She was pretty confident that she would be able to if she had enough time. The problem was that she had to devote half of her daily chakra reserves to keeping her own health, and the other half tending to those who needed her medical assistance the most. Provided that there was any time left in the day after that, she was holed away in Tsunade’s office, taking over what few of the Hokage’s duties she could manage.

What Sakura needed was a helping hand, and the only one she could think of was Kabuto.

“Unless you can think of another one,” she answered.

Naruto sighed and leaned his chair back on two feet. “Okay,” he said with resignation. “I will track down Kabuto and see if I can convince him to help us.”

Sakura wanted to smile, but she wasn’t exactly thrilled by the idea of Naruto putting himself in danger either. If Kabuto was the only problem, she wouldn’t feel so worried, but there were a slew of other things to worry about, too. Kabuto wasn’t likely to be convinced easily – his devotion to Orochimaru was too strong. If anyone could do it, it would be Naruto, but that didn’t make Sakura feel any better.

And if Naruto had a weakness, it was Sasuke. Tracking down Kabuto would probably put him in close proximity to Sasuke, which hadn’t gone so well the last time the two of them saw each other. Sakura could only hope that Sasuke wouldn’t be around to distract him.

“Meet me here tomorrow morning and I’ll give you a full healing session,” she said. “You can leave as soon as we’re done.”

“You got it, Sakura-chan.”

///

The next morning, Sakura dragged herself out of bed after having performed only the bare minimum of healing on herself. She wanted to save most of her chakra for Naruto, who would need it a lot more than she would if he was headed out to find Kabuto today.

So when she lugged herself down to the Hokage tower, managing to take only two short breaks to catch her breath on the way there, she was not amused to see Naruto already waiting for her, bright eyed and bushy tailed.

“Good morning, Sakura-chan,” he said cheerily.

“You look like you slept well,” she said dryly.

“Yeah sometimes being a jinchuuriki isn’t so bad,” he replied with a grin. Sakura glared at him, displeased that he was once again showing her up with that damn Kyuubi. Sakura put years of practice and effort into honing her medical skills and even she couldn’t weather this disease, yet Naruto could wake up in near perfect health after being infected, purely because of the demon inside him.

“Come here,” she sighed, gesturing to the chair. “Let me take a look at you.”

Naruto obliged and Sakura moved in front of him, placing her hands on his chest. A cursory run of diagnostic chakra showed that most of the infection had already been burned off by the kyuubi’s chakra. Sakura burned off what little remained and set up chakra blockades in his heart and lungs so that as the day wore on and the infection began to spread again, it would affect his vitals last.

Naruto was silent while she administered her healing, but he kept his gaze on her face, his eyes sharp and unyielding.

“You really don’t look so good, Sakura-chan,” he said softly. She looked up at his face, concerned by his serious tone. She immediately looked away, unprepared for the worried set of his eyes, the crinkle between his brows.

“I’m fine,” she said, her eyes down at her feet. She removed her hands from his chest and stood up, brushing the dust from her skirt.

“Sakura-chan, listen to me,” he said, his voice stern. She gained the courage to look back at him and found him watching her with narrowed eyes. “I’m going to do whatever it takes to fix this, so don’t you worry about anything. I’ll bring Kabuto back to you and this whole thing will be over soon.”

Sakura smiled. “I know,” she replied. “I know I can count on you.”

“I’ll be back soon. Stay safe while I’m gone.”

“Hold on,” she said, grabbing his elbow just as he turned toward the door. She pushed him back down into the chair and crouched down in front of him. “First we have to go over some ground rules.”

Naruto frowned, but he remained silent.

“I haven’t told Tsunade-sama yet,” Sakura began, “so don’t make a ruckus when you leave. Just slip through the gates quietly and I’ll tell Tsunade-sama before you get back.”

“Shouldn’t we tell her first?” he asked suspiciously.

Sakura shook her head. “She’d never let you go, and I’m sort of inclined to agree with her,” she replied, “but I’m at the end of my rope here, so I really need this to work out.”

Naruto furrowed his brow, but fell silent again.

“Now the infection spreads fairly quickly, so even though you’re fine now, by nightfall your condition will have worsened quite a bit,” she continued. “You’ll need to return here before then because you can’t be out in the woods alone while you’re sick without someone to watch your back.”

“But what if it takes me longer than a day to find Kabuto?” he asked.

“You can take as many days as you need, but you have to return to Konoha every night,” she said firmly. “I know it’s not ideal, but it’s for your own safety.”

“Sakura-chan, the likelihood that I’ll find him less than a day from here is pretty slim,” he said cautiously.

Sakura leaned back on her ankles and heaved a sigh. “I know,” she said patiently, “but just see what you can do.”

Naruto’s frown deepened, but after a moment, the lines of his face smoothed themselves into a smile and he stood up, wrapping his arms around Sakura. “I’ll bring Kabuto back with me,” he said, his breath ghosting over the shell of her ear. “I promise.”

For once, Sakura squeezed back.

///

“You did what?” Tsunade demanded, jolting upright so quickly she knocked the tray in her lap over, spilling its contents onto Sakura’s shoes.

“I know I should have consulted you first,” Sakura said, bending over to pick up the overturned soup bowl near her feet. She grimaced as she righted the tray and placed the soup bowl on the bedside table. “But I’m getting desperate here and I couldn’t think of anything else to do.”

“You should have waited for Gaara’s response,” she snapped, crossing her arms over her chest. “You don’t know what help he could have offered us.”

Sakura didn’t respond as she began sopping up the hot soup with a roll of paper towels. She knew her shishou was right, but she also knew she had done what was necessary. Tsunade never trusted Naruto to be competent on his own, but he always managed to pull through for Konoha. This time would be no different.

“What are you going to do if Naruto doesn’t come back?” Tsunade demanded.

Sakura paused, paper towel in hand hovering over the linoleum floor. Above her, Tsunade sighed and shifted so that her legs were hanging off the bed near Sakura’s shoulders.

“Sakura, I know this ordeal has been very hard on you,” she said, her voice calm but laced with underlying disapproval. “This is a lot to put on your shoulders, and I know you’re frustrated. But you knew I didn’t approve of this decision and you let Naruto go anyway. How do you feel knowing that you might have sent that boy off to his death?”

Angrily, Sakura tossed the paper towel onto the tray and stood to face her teacher. “Naruto isn’t going to die,” she said fiercely. “You never give him enough credit.”

“Maybe you just give him too much.”

The back of Sakura’s eyes began to prickle and she clenched her fists together tightly.

“Don’t give me those crocodile tears, Sakura,” Tsunade said wearily. “You did this yourself. If you’re worried, you should be. But there’s nothing that can be done about it now.”

Sakura swallowed her tears and gave her mentor a stern look. “Naruto will bring Kabuto back here, just you wait and see,” she said smugly.

Tsunade’s face softened and she reached out to place a comforting hand on her apprentice’s shoulder. As harsh as Tsunade was with her, she would always have a soft spot for her pink haired student. She opened her mouth to speak, but before she could say anything, a bellow down the hall cut her off.

“Sakura!”

The pinkette rolled her eyes at the sound of Ino screaming her name. Sakura had yet to make her rounds for the day because of her early morning appointment with Naruto, so she was certain Ino and the rest of her patients were sorely missing their daily healing sessions by now.

Sakura looked to her mentor’s face, seeking approval.

“Go on,” she said with a wave of her hand. She sank back down onto her mattress and eased herself back under the covers. “Finish your rounds. You can report back to me tonight after you’ve finished and gotten some rest.”

“Yes, Tsunade-shishou,” Sakura said, bowing her head respectfully.


	2. Chapter 2

Sakura tapped her toe impatiently, watching Ino slowly slurp soup out of a steaming mug. “Could you hurry up, please,” she asked, scowling. “I’ve got other patients to see today.”

Ino rolled her eyes, setting the mug on the table beside her. “It’s fine,” she said with a sniff of disdain. “I guess I can eat later.”

Begrudgingly, Sakura pulled her chair up next to Ino’s bed and placed her palm on the blonde’s forehead. Ino had been sick longer than anyone else in Konoha, but she didn’t necessarily have it the worst. Having some experience with medical ninjutsu, Ino was able to fight off the infection at least a little bit on her own. Sakura didn’t think it was quite fair that she needed to take care of Ino first every day, but Tsunade had insisted, claiming that any new development with the infection would start with Ino first since she had been the first to contract the illness.

“How are your symptoms today?” Sakura asked, sending a surge of chakra into Ino’s heart and lungs. “Still nauseous and dizzy?”

Ino nodded silently, closing her eyes to relax into the feeling of Sakura’s chakra in her body.

“Do you feel better or worse today?”

Ino cracked an eye open to give Sakura an irritated look. “The same,” she answered curtly, “just like every other time you’ve asked.”

Sakura decided to ignore her surly tone, because well, Ino was sick and didn’t feel good, and Sakura wasn’t a medic because she didn’t have a tender heart. Instead of snapping back, Sakura pulled her hand away and picked up the mug of soup, pressing it back into Ino’s hands.

“Here,” she said wearily. “Eat your soup then. I’ll be back to check on you again later this afternoon.”

“Wait, wait!” Ino said, grabbing for Sakura with her free hand as she moved toward the door. “Can you just get rid of my headache, please? My head is pounding and I haven’t been able to sleep because of it.”

Sakura gave her a look of disapproval. “You remember that I’m taking care of literally every single person in Konoha right now, right?” she asked. “I don’t have any extra chakra to spare. If you can live through it, then you’ll just have to deal with it.”

Ino scowled, but then her expression softened. “I’m sorry, Forehead,” she said. “I know you’re dealing with a lot right now.”

For a moment, Sakura considered telling Ino about Naruto, but she didn’t want to get her hopes up about a cure if it wasn’t a sure thing. Besides, Ino would gossip and spread the news all over Konoha and the last thing Sakura needed was for the entire village to hope for something that probably wouldn’t happen.

“It’s okay, Pig,” she replied. “I know it’s not fun for you to be sick either.”

“Great, then could you at least go get me some aspirin or something?”

Sakura rolled her eyes.

///

Kakashi was next on Sakura’s list because while he had managed to remain uninfected for much longer than the rest of Konoha, he definitely had the worst case she had seen.

She entered his room to find a curled up lump on his mattress, covered completely by his sheets. Sakura flicked the light switch, casting a harsh florescent glow over the room. Somewhere beneath his layers of blankets, Kakashi groaned.

“Wake up, Kakashi-sensei,” she said cheerily. “Time for your healing session.”

He poked his head through a hole in the covers, his hair wild and unruly and his face ghostly white. Sakura giggled at the sight of him and pulled up a chair next to his bed.

“Ah, my favorite part of the day,” he croaked.

Sakura gave him a sympathetic look as she funneled her chakra into his system. His skin was drenched in sweat, which had soaked through his sheets and left them feeling damp and chilly. “We really need to wash these linens,” she pointed out. He said nothing, his eyes closed like Ino’s had been. She thought for a moment that this would be the perfect opportunity to rip off his mask. In his weakened state he’d never be able to catch her. She didn’t think it was prudent for him to be wearing it – not when he was having difficulty breathing as it was.

But she wasn’t going to break his trust, no matter how curious she was.

“How are your symptoms?” she asked. “Have they gotten any better?”

Ruefully, Kakashi shook his head. “Same as always,” he answered.

Sakura frowned. It wasn’t as though this was new information – it had been this way since the beginning. It was lucky that no one was getting worse since they had no viable cure as of right now. But it was also concerning that no one seemed to be getting better. Many diseases and illnesses merely needed to run their course, but that didn’t seem to be the case for this one.

But it was still frustrating that after months of enduring this, there was no end in sight.

Kakashi eased himself into a sitting position, arranging his blankets around him carefully. Sakura could hear the bones in his body popping and knew his muscles were probably stiff from disuse by now. He must have hated being bedridden and completely useless.

“I know you don’t want to share much with your sick, old sensei, but be straight with me, Sakura,” he said. “How bleak do things really look right now?”

Sakura cast her eyes away from him nervously. She wasn’t fond of the feeling of everyone in Konoha putting their faith in her to figure things out. She knew she was smart and capable, but this was a lot of pressure to put on one person. Especially considering that she was failing miserably at finding any progressive solution. It seemed all she was capable of for now was keeping the village afloat.

“I hate to disappoint you, Kakashi-sensei, but I haven’t made any progress on a cure,” she explained. “I think I could if I had enough time, but it’s difficult to spare time for research when I’m the only one who can care for the sick.”

His eye crinkled above his mask – an actually, genuine smile, the first she had seen in weeks. “How could I be disappointed, Sakura?” he asked. “You’re doing everything you can and you can’t do anything more than that.”

She frowned, unable to meet his gaze. He wasn’t patronizing her – he believed what he was saying. But it wasn’t good enough.

“Everything I can do isn’t quite good enough,” she replied, “so that’s why I’ve sent Naruto out to track down Kabuto.”

Kakashi’s smile disappeared, replaced immediately with a brow furrowed with concern. “Does Tsunade-sama know about this?” he asked.

Sakura nodded. “She doesn’t think it’s a good idea.”

“It isn’t,” he said. He looked like he had more admonishing things to say, but he remained silent, gazing toward the window on the other side of the room.

“If there’s one person out there who can help us with this, it’s Kabuto,” she said quietly, already expecting the worst reaction from him. “I’m getting desperate, Kakashi-sensei. I can’t keep this up for much longer.”

“I don’t trust Kabuto, Sakura,” he replied, “but I do trust you. I know you’ll be able to figure this out.”

“Wow,” she said, blinking in surprise. “I didn’t expect you to be so supportive.”

“I’ll always be supportive of my favorite student,” he said, bringing back that winning smile.

She rolled her eyes and scooted her chair back away from his bed. “If you can manage standing up for long enough, you need to take a shower today,” she advised. “I’ll wash your sheets for you, but it won’t do any good if you get back in them as sweaty and gross as you are now.”

“Oof,” Kakashi said, lifting his arm to sniff dramatically at his armpits. “Am I really that bad?” He recoiled in disgust at the smell of his own filth. “I suppose I am. But I’m not sure I’m really feeling up for a shower. Maybe a sponge bath instead?”

She lobbed a pen at him, striking his temple with what could have been deadly accuracy. “Don’t be a pervert, Kakashi-sensei.”

He gave her a wounded look, but after a moment he tossed the covers aside and slowly pulled himself up to his feet. A wave of nausea must have crawled over him then, because he doubled over, holding his fist in front of his mouth. Sakura rushed to his side and hooked her arm through his.

“Stand still for a moment,” she said, coursing more chakra into his body to alleviate some of his discomfort. He obliged, remaining motionless until she had pulled her arm away from his. “Think you can make it to the bathroom on your own?” she asked.

He took a shaky step forward. Sakura could hear his breath, slow and labored. She watched as he slowly made his way to the attached bathroom. Once he reached the door, he leaned against the frame for support and turned back to look at his pink-haired student. “Look,” he said with an eye-crinkling smile, “I made it to the bathroom all by myself.”

Sakura laughed politely for his benefit, but it pained her to see him in such poor condition. When she had been just a genin, she thought of Kakashi as invincible. She could always rely on him to protect her. Now he could barely walk ten feet across his hospital room.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, sensing something amiss by the worried look on her face.

“Nothing, Kakashi-sensei,” she answered. “Take your shower, while I wash your sheets.”

She saw the movement under his mask that indicated a frown, but he said nothing. He stood motionless for a moment, his fingers white-knuckled against the doorframe. But after a moment, he disappeared into the bathroom.

///

Sakura washed Kakashi’s sheets, as well as the sheets of the other ten patients on his floor. This was the kind of grunt work she wasn’t used to doing at the hospital – her time and chakra were too valuable to waste on menial tasks like these. But now she enjoyed the mindless work and the reprieve it gave her.

By the time she had returned to Kakashi’s room, he had finished his shower and was sitting on his bare mattress, his face turned toward the open window.

“You should really keep that closed,” Sakura advised.

“I’m already sick, aren’t I?” he asked, not bothering to turn and face her. “It’s not like I can get more sick.”

Sakura knew that wasn’t necessarily true, but she didn’t have it in her to argue with him about it. Instead, she marched over to the window and pulled it shut before turning to face him. He scowled at her and she felt a pang of guilt because she knew how miserable this must be for him and she had literally sucked the air out of the room.

“How about we go for a walk?” she suggested. “Are you feeling up for that?”

Kakashi eyed her skeptically with his one exposed eye. “Don’t you have other patients to attend to?” he asked.

“I have an entire village to attend to,” she said. “Let’s go.”

With an amused huff of breath, Kakashi slowly got to his feet. Sakura helped ease him into the chair beside his bed while she replaced his sheets and then took his arm to lead him out to the courtyard below. His pace was agonizingly slow. Sakura realized this was likely due to his nausea and dizziness, but she couldn’t afford to waste any of her chakra on something so small when she still had everyone else to see before she day was over.

When they finally reached the courtyard, Sakura breathed in deeply, welcoming the feeling of the soft breeze against her skin, the fragrant smell of the garden flowers. She heard Kakashi inhale deeply, too, and she glanced over at him to see him smiling toward the sun.

“It’s been weeks since I’ve stepped foot outside,” he mused. “I really missed the fresh air.”

Sakura led him forward, keeping a careful eye on the cobblestone path below to prevent him from stumbling. She figured he would be a bit tired from doing so much walking after being bedridden for so long, but he seemed to have acquired more energy somehow. He skin looked healthier and there was a pleasant flush on his visible cheek.

“How are you feeling, Kakashi-sensei?” she asked, letting go of his arm so that he could walk around on his own. He took a few steps forward, his eyes still drawn upward toward the cloudless sky. He pushed up his hitae-ate, revealing his Sharingan, and turned back to face her.

“Better than I have in weeks, Sakura,” he replied.

Sakura’s brow furrowed and she took a few steps forward to reach for his arm again. It would be nice to believe that all he needed was a bit of fresh air, but Sakura knew better than that. She inhaled deeply through her nose, breathing in the scents of the gardens. The hospital kept its garden growing with all kinds of herbs and plants with medicinal, healing properties. Perhaps one of them was what seemed to be improving his condition now.

“Do you feel well enough to walk to the greenhouse?” she asked.

Kakashi glanced down at her with a raised brow, and then off toward the greenhouse, which was several hundred feet away.

“What about your other patients?” he asked with concern. “Shouldn’t you be getting back to them?”

Sakura gave an apathetic shrug. “It’s for my sanity,” she lied. She didn’t want to get his hopes up, but she suspected there was something either out here in the gardens or somewhere in the greenhouse that could help her find a starting point on the cure for this disease.

The look Kakashi gave her was one of disapproval, but there was also mischievous glint in his eyes, and she knew deep down he was just selfish enough to take her up on this offer.

“Yeah,” he agreed, “for the sake of your sanity, we should go to the greenhouse.”

Sakura grinned as she hooked her arm tighter around his.

///

There was a reason Sakura had a strong penchant for greenhouses. The air inside was warm and fragrant, and something about the greenness of it made Sakura feel right at home. She breathed in deeply, eyeing the plants that were lined up alongside the walls, in rows down the length of the greenhouse.

Most of the plants were surviving just fine without constant care. Of course the orderlies who usually tended to the gardens and the greenhouse were sick, too, and all of their duties forgotten. Still, only a few of the plants had begun to wilt, browning the edges of the leaves.

“The temperature in here is perfect,” Kakashi mused as Sakura walked him between rows of garlic and white snakeroot.

Sakura hummed her acknowledgement, though she didn’t necessarily agree. The sun shone brightly through the glass slats above, trapping its heat inside. It was a little warm for Sakura’s taste, but she understood why Kakashi enjoyed it.

In fact, he seemed to be more than enjoying it – he was thriving in it. Sakura could see by the crinkle near his eye that he was smiling beneath his mask. He took a steady step away from Sakura, releasing his arm from her grasp. His footsteps were firm against the soft earth and he didn’t seem to need any support to remain balanced. Sakura watched him take a few sure footsteps along the path.

“Still feeling dizzy?” she asked.

He turned back over his shoulder to look at her. “A little,” he replied.

“How about nauseous?”

He shook his head. “No nausea.”

A bit surprised, she beamed at him. “That’s good,” she replied. “It means something in here must be alleviating that symptom. Do you mind walking around to figure out what it is?”

He was one step ahead of her, skimming his fingers along the wooden planters as he meandered down the rows of plants. Sakura followed him, watching him closely to see if there was any change she might be able to see.

Kakashi stopped in front of a large planter, easing himself down into a sitting position against the wooden ledge. Tentatively, he reached forward and grazed a leaf of the large, green, almost tree-like plant inside. “What is this?” he asked, tugging on its leaf gently.

“Garden angelica,” she answered. “It’s an edible plant, wild celery. Mostly used for the culinary, but does have a few healing properties. It’s known to stave off infection and fever.”

With a grunt of acknowledgement, Kakashi plucked the leaf from its stem and turned his face away from her so he could pop the entire thing into his mouth. He grimaced, but chewed and swallowed nonetheless, giving Sakura a dry look. “It’s bitter.”

“The stalk is the edible part,” she said with a giggle.

Kakashi wrinkled his nose in disgust, but it did little to dissuade the smile that was still present in his features.

“Is this what’s making you feel better?” she asked.

“I think so,” he answered with a little uncertainty.

Sakura reached down to her feet where pair of garden shears were propped against the side of the planter. Carefully, she snipped a few stalks from the plant and hefted them into an empty pot nearby. “I’ll take this with me when I make my rounds today so I can be certain whether it’s helpful,” she explained, “and if it is, then I’ve just found my starting point for the cure.”

“Glad I could help,” Kakashi said, giving her an ear-splitting grin.

///

Sakura made her rounds as usual, carrying her plant around with her and placing it beside each patient’s bed as she went. It was hard not to notice the improvement in mood that seemed to infect everyone just by the presence of the mere plant.

When she had made her way through the hospital and cared for the most ill patients, she next made her way toward the Hyuuga compound. The Hyuugas were notoriously intolerant of subpar medical care, which was why most of them were under strict instructions to seek out only Sakura or Tsunade for any medical care they required. Sakura found this to be more annoying than anything else – the other medics were just as capable of handling minor medical issues. Now, it was a burden. At least most of the other villagers were able to care for each other in their sickness. The Hyuugas demanded Sakura’s personal care, which was why she found herself strolling the streets on the way to their compound.

“Good morning, Hiashi-sama,” Sakura greeted as she entered the main house, pulling the sliding door shut behind her. She flipped on the light switch and placed the plant on the coffee table in the middle of the room.

Hiashi sat on the sofa, his jaw clenched tightly. He scowled as light flooded the room and readjusted the blanket that was strewn over his lap. “You’re late,” he said through gritted teeth. “It’s nearly noon.”

“I apologize, Hiashi-sama,” she replied, even though she felt anything but sorry. “I was working toward a cure this morning, and I think I’ve found something that might be useful.”

She jerked her chin toward the plant on the table. Hiashi leaned forward slightly, the stringy wisps of his hair falling into his eyes. “This?” he asked, nudging the pot with his toe. “It’s just a plant.”

“It seems to be helping with everyone’s nausea,” she replied patiently. “I thought maybe you’d like to try to eat a piece of the stalk. If it helps, I will give some to the rest of your clan as well. Just until I can figure out how to work it into a viable vaccine.”

“You want me to be your guinea pig?”

“Kakashi-sensei was my guinea pig,” she said tersely. “He said it vastly improved his nausea and he was able to walk around without my help. Now would you like to try it or not?”

Hiashi crossed his arms over his chest, and though he probably meant to look imposing and intimidating, he came off looking surly and petulant instead. “Fine,” he conceded, “but don’t be late again.”

Sakura nearly rolled her eyes, but just barely restrained herself. It was a certainty that she would be late again – she needed to work on a vaccine. The village couldn’t go on like this forever, and if that meant that Hiashi had to suck it up and deal with his illness without Sakura, so be it.

Using a kunai from her pocket, Sakura cut off a small piece of the celery’s stalk and passed it over to Hiashi. He begrudgingly took it and began taking small bites as Sakura placed her hand on his chest and began to funnel her healing chakra into his system.

She made quick work of him because she was on a time crunch having spent so much extra time in the greenhouse that morning. When she had finished with Hiashi, she quickly swept the rest of the Hyuuga compound before returning to Hiashi’s living room with the plant in hand. He was sitting up a little straighter now, and the sheen of sweat that had clung to his skin before was now gone.

“Did the celery help, Hiashi-sama?” she asked.

The look he gave her was so near a smile that Sakura felt a brief flash of pride. She was the best medic nin in the entire world, but her bedside manner wasn’t always top notch (or so she had been told). If she could make a man like Hiashi smile, though, she couldn’t be too bad at it.

“Yes,” he answered, “I do feel a little better that usual.”

Sakura hefted the potted plant from her hip back onto his coffee table. “Then you can keep this one,” she said. “Don’t eat more than necessary – just a small piece like the one I gave you earlier per day will do.”

Hiashi nodded curtly and Sakura left the compound, glowing with accomplishment. That was one of the tricks Tsunade had taught her – schmoozing. The Hyuuga clan was powerful in Konoha and anything to bolster their relationship with the Hokage (and her apprentice) would only be beneficial to them. It often paid to have friends in high places, and Sakura hoped her gift to Hiashi would warm him to her.

With the Hyuuga’s all healed, Sakura made her way to the civilian district, where she spent the rest of the afternoon. The civilians weren’t so picky about who helped them, but since Sakura was the only person capable of venturing so far, she made the daily trip out to the neighborhood to heal as many people as she could. It was a nice treat after going to the Hyuuga compound – all the civilians were grateful for her help, and even offered her small gifts like food and other amenities. It was the exact reason why Sakura scheduled her days like this.

But the time she had exhausted nearly all her chakra in the civilian district, she wearily made her way back to the Hokage tower to find Tsunade.

Tsunade was sitting up on her bed, her legs dangling over the sides. In her lap was a scroll, unfurled and curling its way down the side of the bed and into a pile near her feet. Her brow was furrowed and she traced her finger along the parchment, mumbling something under her breath.

“Tsunade-sama,” Sakura greeted, easing the door shut behind her. “How are you feeling?”

The Hokage glanced up from her lap at her apprentice, her eyes widening. “Sakura, where have you been?” she demanded, tossing the scroll aside and standing up. Shakily, she took a step forward, extending her arm toward Sakura.

Sakura rushed to her mentor’s side and hooked her arm through hers to steady her. “I’m sorry I’m a bit later than usual,” she replied, guiding Tsunade to the chair beside the bed. “I was working on some research with Kakashi-sensei this morning.”

“What sort of research?” Tsunade asked as she lowered herself carefully down into the chair.

“I took him out to the greenhouse so he could get some fresh air and stretch his legs a bit,” Sakura explained, “and while we were there we looked for possible plants that could help in the vaccine.”

“And what did you find?”

Sakura reached down into her pocket and pulled out a small plastic bag, which held a few cut pieces of the celery stalk. She unzipped the bag and handing a piece to Tsunade, who sniffed at it with disdain.

“Garden angelica?” she asked. “Yuck.”

“Everyone who has eaten a piece today said they felt decreased nausea,” Sakura explained dryly. “I think this is a good starting point for the cure.”

“Herbal remedies are one direction we could go,” Tsunade conceded, “but I’ve been working on something else.” She reached over to her nightstand and grabbed a small vial filled with clear, bluish liquid. “This is liquefied chakra. It’s completely raw like this, and probably useless without being inside a body that can manipulate it. However, I’ve been researching ways to liquefy healing chakra specifically, which might help you come us come up with a more potent and accessible vaccine.”

Burning with curiosity, Sakura snatched the vial out of her mentor’s hand and held it up to the light to get a closer look. “How did you liquefy it?” she demanded.

Tsunade pointed to the scroll that still sat coiled up beside the bed. “It’s a jutsu I learned from Orochimaru,” she explained. “I can’t say what he was using it for – nothing good I’m sure. But I think it’ll come in handy for us now.”

Sakura peered at her teacher with curiosity. When had she learned such a jutsu from Orochimaru?

“We can talk more about it later,” Tsunade insisted. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to begin my healing session now. We can start more work on all this tomorrow.”

“Yes,” Sakura agreed. “Tomorrow.”


	3. Chapter 3

The breeze that blew Sakura’s hair into her eyes also sent a sharp shiver down her spine – one that foreboded more than just a harsh winter. There was something sinister about the chilled air, something that set Sakura on edge. She leaned against the railing at the top of the Hokage tower, watching the sun dip beneath the line of trees in the distance. The orange glow in the sky was rapidly dimming and Naruto had not yet returned.

Her eyes lingered near the village gates, the abandoned kiosk where travelers were required to check in. There were no travelers now, none that Sakura knew of anyway. If any strangers wanting to enter Konoha weren’t put off by the smell of sickness that permeated the entire village, the lack of a welcoming party should have deterred them.

The only traveler to be expected now was Naruto.

Sakura reached out with a probing chakra, searching for the familiar, overpowering chakra of the tailed-beast. She sensed nothing. In the distance she could see the sky darkened by grey storm clouds. Rain wouldn’t be good for the sick, and it certainly wouldn’t be good for Naruto.

With a heavy sigh that did little to provide any catharsis, Sakura turned around and sank down to the ground. She let her head fall back against the railing and pressed her lips together. She had been sure her venture into the greenhouse with Kakashi had granted her somewhat of an advantage. For weeks her research had stagnated, placed on the back burner while everyone so desperately needed her help. It had been a shock to see that Tsunade had been working on some research of her own.

It wasn’t really all that surprising if she thought about it. Tsunade had always favored jutsu and chakra for healing, while Sakura had always gravitated toward herbal, plant-based medicine. That wasn’t to say that Sakura didn’t know anything about medical jutsu. It was her specialty, after all. It was just that chemical and plant-based medicine didn’t require chakra, and so it could be used when chakra reserves get low, or by civilians. It was handy knowledge to spread, handier knowledge to put to good use.

But it had gotten Sakura nowhere with this particular case. Not that she had been trying very hard to begin with. She was too exhausted to focus. Now she felt guilty for letting Tsunade take the reigns while she was ill.

A drop of frigid rain landed on her cheek, breaking her out of her reverie. She glanced up at the sky and found dark clouds hanging overhead now, swept across the village by the swift winds. Nervously, she peered over the railing toward Konoha’s gates. Naruto really should have been back by now.

Another surge of probing chakra showed nothing, so with resignation, Sakura leapt over the railing and landed on the roof of a nearby building. If circumstances had been different, she might have stayed there all night waiting for him to come back, but she couldn’t do that now. She needed enough sleep to recover her chakra fully, and with the impending rain, she couldn’t risk worsening her own condition. Too many people were relying on her – she couldn’t be out of commission.

She made her way quickly back to her apartment, trying not to feel spooked by how empty the streets were, how dark everything was. Usually this time of night was primetime in the civilian district. The restaurants were open and bustling with activity, warm lights from the residential windows lit the streets below. It was like a ghost town now, and it left Sakura feeling unsettled.

When she had made it safely back to her apartment and changed into her comfiest, most unflattering pajamas, she allowed her body to catch up with her brain. She was nauseous, and her head was pounding. Her stomach growled loudly and she remembered that she had hardly eaten at all. She didn’t have the appetite to eat anything now. She was too worried about Naruto, and the apprehension made her dry heave over her kitchen sink. She filled a glass with tap water and drank it greedily, wetting her parched throat. She gasped for air and then immediately threw up into the sink.

It was hard to tell whether the tears on her cheeks were from the force of her vomiting or the slew of other reasons she had to be upset. She was still unsure when she sank down to her mattress and pulled her covers up to her chin. For a fleeting moment, an image of Sasuke popped into her mind. Was he sick right now, too? Was he okay?

Quickly, she shook his image from her head and closed her eyes.

///

“Wow, you look awful.”

Sakura gave Ino a dry look as she tucked fresh sheets around her mattress. Ino sat beside her in the chair next to her bed, watching with disapproval.

“I’m serious,” she continued, “you look like you’re getting worse. How do you feel?”

“I’m fine, Ino,” Sakura said, brushing the comment away. She knew she looked worse because she had not slept well. She had tossed and turned, worried about Naruto. He had still not returned yet and Sakura knew that this was at least a partial reason for her increased nausea today.

“But don’t you think it’s strange that you’re getting worse?” Ino pressed. “No one else has gotten worse past a certain point. Do you think that means something?”

“I’m not getting worse,” Sakura insisted.

“Are you taking care of yourself properly?” Ino asked. “That might be part of it. You know you need to be getting a full eight hours of sleep every night. And you look pretty thin. Are you eating enough? You have a tendency to forget how to take care of yourself while you’re taking care of others. You always do this on missions.”

“Ino, please, can you just drop it?”

A bit shakily, Ino got to her feet and placed her hands on Sakura’s shoulders. “Hey,” she said, looking straight into Sakura’s eyes in a way that was very unnerving. “I know I’ve been a pain in the ass since I’ve gotten sick, and I’ll try to do better, starting right now. You need to take a break. Let me help you.”

Sakura stared at her for a moment. She looked gaunt and thin, too, and there were dark circles under her eyes that did little to dull the brightness of her irises. She looked concerned with her brow furrowed and her head tilted slightly as she waited for Sakura’s reply. Perhaps it was just because her emotions were running high, but Sakura felt moved by Ino’s sincerity.

“Okay,” Sakura finally said. “I could really use some help.”

Ino grinned. “Anything,” she said. “Tell me what you need.”

“Do you feel good enough to take a stroll down to the greenhouse?”

“Anything that’s not this fucking hospital room is fine with me.”

///

Ino seemed to come more alive down in the greenhouse. A glow had returned to her skin and a smile stayed adhered to her face as she slowly ambled down the rows of planters. Sakura was well aware of Ino’s penchant for plants and flowers, so she felt rather foolish for not having thought of this before.

“So,” Sakura began, watching as Ino lifted a flower to her face to sniff it. “Tsunade-sama has been working on a liquefied chakra that we’ll be able to use in the vaccine. I was thinking we could combine what she’s researching with some herbal remedies. Hopefully the effects of the plants will be bolstered by the chakra, and perhaps whatever else we end up using in the vaccine.”

Ino nodded and sat down on the wooden bench beside her, curling up slightly as she attempted to catch her breath. Sakura was instantly by her side, her hands alight with green, healing chakra. “Are you okay?” she asked, pressing her hand to Ino’s forehead.

Ino waved her away dismissively. “Just a little tired from the walk,” she explained. “It’s been weeks since I’ve walked that much. I really do feel much better down here.”

Sakura nodded in understanding. “Kakashi-sensei did, too.”

“What?” Ino shrieked. “You took that old man down here before me? I should take priority for this kind of thing! I’m your best friend!”

With a barely refrained eye roll, Sakura narrowed her eyes at her ‘best friend.’ “Kakashi-sensei is in much worse condition than you are,” she explained. “He really needed this. Besides, he got to come down here for one trip and you’re going to be here every day until we can work out a cure.”

“Wow, putting me to good use, aren’t you?” Ino asked incredulously.

“Yeah,” Sakura replied dryly, “I can’t imagine how hard this will be on you.”

Ino giggled, which turned into full-blown laughter. After a moment, Sakura began to laugh, too, which was far more cathartic than anything she had done in the last few weeks.

“Sorry, Sakura,” Ino said. “I’ll do my best to help you out here.”

///

By the time Sakura had finished her rounds and had made it back to the Hokage tower to check in with Tsunade, she was exhausted. The sleep she had lost worrying over Naruto had really taken a toll on her, and all she could think about now was crawling deep under her covers and never coming out.

Tsunade was in her bed when Sakura entered the room, sitting up and leaning against the headboard. The lengthy scroll was unfurled in her lap again, pooling beside her bed on the floor.

“Sakura,” she greeted. “Naruto still hasn’t returned yet?”

Sakura shook her head regretfully. “No sign of him,” she replied. She was anticipating the gloating she was sure Tsunade would engage in now that it was a proven fact she had been right. Sakura never should have allowed Naruto to leave – not in conditions like these. For all they knew, Naruto had succumbed to the disease and was lying on the ground somewhere helpless, or worse – dead.

But the look on Tsunade’s face was one of pity and understanding instead of self-righteousness.

“How did your rounds go?” Tsunade asked softly in her best attempt to distract Sakura from her current thoughts.

“Same as usual,” Sakura answered, trying her best to keep the waver out of her voice. She knew it was only a matter of time before her emotions overcame her – she wasn’t strong enough to deal with them without bursting into tears at some point. So far she had managed to keep her cool, but something about the very maternal way Tsunade was tiptoeing around the Naruto issue made her want to cry.

“I took Ino down to the greenhouse to work on some herbal remedies,” she continued. “I’m hoping she can provide us with some kind of elixir to help with the vaccine.”

“If she’s well enough to work in the greenhouse, she should be helping you with your rounds,” Tsunade said dryly. “You’re the one I need to be working on the cure. Not her.”

Sakura shook her head in dismay. “She can’t walk far distances,” she explained. “Even just walking to the greenhouse tired her. If this is all she can do, that’s enough for me.”

Tsunade frowned and began rolling up the scroll in her lap. “How is Shizune doing?” she asked, her voice still soft in an almost unsettling kind of way.

“Same as before,” Sakura answered. “She’s still dehydrated and having trouble keeping water down.”

“I see,” Tsunade said. Sakura could see the cogs whirling in her head. “And the civilians?”

“They’ve managed to be mostly self-sufficient,” Sakura answered. “It seems that we shinobi were affected more than civilians, but they’ll still need daily care. At least they can manage to eat and bathe on their own. I noticed in particular that most of them show only vomiting and nausea as symptoms. Dizziness, sore throats, and muscle pain seem to be reserved for those with more serious cases like Kakashi-sensei.”

“That’s an interesting discovery,” Tsunade mused. “Why should an infection differentiate between a shinobi and a civilian? What different does it make?”

“My assumption is that is has something to do with chakra pathways,” Sakura conjectured. “I’m willing to bet that opened chakra pathways create a faster route of travel for the infection, allowing it to spread quickly and into areas it might not be able to with a person who has never used or opened chakra pathways before.”

Tsunade pursed her lips, glancing down at the scroll in her lap. “Do you think you’d be able to test that theory?” she asked.

Sakura shrugged. “Possibly,” she answered. “I could use a known infection to test on a willing subject, but if that infection doesn’t spread via chakra pathways, the test will be useless. The only other way would be to use a sample of the actual bacteria. I feel that might be a bit risky considering we have no cure yet.”

“Can’t you just observe the chakra pathways of someone currently infected?” Tsunade suggested. “If the infection spreads that way, then surely we’ve all got traces of the bacteria in our chakra pathways already.”

“Perhaps,” Sakura agreed. “When I make my rounds tomorrow, I will make sure to check everyone’s chakra pathways.”

Both Sakura and Tsunade fell silent. The room seemed infinitely smaller with neither of them talking. Sakura knew it was only a matter of time before Tsunade brought up Naruto. They couldn’t go without discussing it. He was gone, supposed to have returned by now but still mysteriously absent. It certainly wasn’t out of character for Naruto to be headstrong and foolish, but he was at least considerate. He wouldn’t have disobeyed Sakura’s order without a good reason. He would have at least sent word to her that he was alright – Sakura knew it.

Tsunade let out a heavy sigh and moved the scroll from her lap to the table beside the bed. She patted the mattress beside her, indicating to Sakura that she should sit down.

Sakura didn’t want to. She was on the verge of tears as it was, and she just knew that whatever Tsunade was about to say to her would open the floodgates. She stood idle for a moment, debating whether or not she’d be able to somehow get away right now. Maybe she could pretend to feel sick, or vomit – whatever it took to get herself out of this room.

But after a second, she begrudgingly joined Tsunade on the bed. The mattress dipped under her weight, pulling her closer to her mentor until their thighs were touching and Sakura could feel the immense heat emanating from her body.

“I never wanted to be Hokage, Sakura,” Tsunade said. Sakura furrowed her brow. She knew this already and she didn’t see why it was relevant now. “There were a lot of reasons why,” she continued, “but one of the biggest reasons was that I knew the toll it takes on a person to shoulder so much responsibility. I wasn’t sure I could handle that kind of pressure. What if I made too many mistakes? What if I couldn’t protect Konoha the way Sarutobi-sensei did?”

“I think you’re a fine Hokage, Tsunade-sama,” Sakura said, not exactly sure where her teacher was going with this.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Tsunade replied, “but my biggest fear was that I wouldn’t be able to instill the Will of Fire in the village. I left Konoha because it was too painful to be here where the people I had been too weak to protect had died. That’s the exact opposite of the Will of Fire. I should have stayed here, should have fought harder to put medics on each squad, to improve medical conditions at the hospital, to save as many lives as I could. But I didn’t. I never considered myself to have the Will of Fire.”

Sakura, too nervous to look at Tsunade’s face, glanced down at her own feet, fidgeting. She had sort of suspected all this before, but it was unsettling to hear it straight from the Hokage’s mouth.

Tsunade sighed deeply again and reached into Sakura’s lap to grab her hand. Sakura allowed the contact, even though she suddenly felt very nervous about the situation. Why was she saying all these things?

“When I think about you, Sakura,” Tsunade said, “I’m so glad I chose to come back. When I think about how much the village needs you right now, and how willing you are to step up and take care of it… I’m just so proud of you for doing what I was so reluctant to do. You have the Will of Fire Sakura. Sometimes I wonder if I’ve somehow failed Konoha, but it’s hard to feel that way when I look at all the amazing things you have accomplished. I wasn’t kidding when I said you’d be well suited for this job.”

Sakura choked back a sob that threatened to rip its way out of her throat. She hadn’t been expected such serious, emotional words from her usually stoic mentor. It wasn’t like Tsunade to wax poetic like this. It made Sakura feel uneasy, like something was really, really wrong.

“And it’s not just you, Sakura,” Tsunade continued, oblivious to, or willfully ignorant of Sakura’s emotional state. “Naruto has the Will of Fire, too. Between the two of you, I know that Konoha will be protected.”

Without meaning to, Sakura let the sob escape her. Hot tears brimmed in her eyes and she brushed them away with trembling fingers. “I can’t help but feel like I sent him to his death,” she said, her voice shaking through her tears.

Tsunade was silent for a moment and Sakura chanced a look up at her face. She had half-expected the ‘I told you so’ look, but it looked like Tsunade was just as worried about Naruto as Sakura was.

“He isn’t dead, Sakura,” Tsunade said. “You and I both know Naruto won’t go down without a fight. He’ll come back. Just give him some time.”

“But Tsunade-sama—”

“He’ll come back,” she interrupted, “and when he does, you can beat the shit out of him for scaring us like this.”

Sakura let out a bark of a laugh before succumbing to her tears, letting them trail hotly down her cheeks. She felt Tsunade’s arm come to rest on her shoulder, so she leaned into her mentor, her Hokage, and cried.

///

When Naruto had been gone for five days, Sakura took her first steps outside of the village in weeks. She sat for a long time above the village gates, watching the wind rustle the leaves. The sky was inky black and the silence was deafening. Naruto couldn’t have been nearby – she would have sensed or heard him. But something about the eeriness in the woods was calling to her.

She clenched her jaw, teetering between the jump down to the other side of the wall and the careful climb back down to the safe side of the gates. She really should have been in bed sleeping. The last five days she had been wrought with worry, losing sleep and morale until she had hit her breaking point and cried into Tsunade’s chest. Tsunade seemed to have expected Sakura to do this, and instead of pushing her away as she might have done, she allowed Sakura to cry into her. She allowed it every night, in fact. Every night since Naruto had left.

It was through sheer desperation that Sakura forewent her nightly meeting with Tsunade and found herself perched and angled toward the darkness. Even if she went to Tsunade, she had no news for her. Even if she went home, she wouldn’t have been able to sleep.

She didn’t have a plan, though. All she knew was that a step outside of the village was a step closer to Naruto. A step outside of the village was the closest thing she could have to freedom.

Gritting her teeth with determination, Sakura hopped down to the earth on the other side of the gate and took a few ambling steps toward the trees. There was little noise from the woods – an occasional chirp of a cricket, a call or two from a bird. It was strange to look into the trees, which seemed so much like an empty void now, and to know that there were no ANBU out there patrolling. There had always been a comfort in knowing that the ANBU were keeping constant surveillance, knowing who approached the village before they got close. Now they could be surprised at any moment, by anyone.

Hopefully, that someone would be Naruto, Sakura thought as she walked deeper into the woods. She didn’t know exactly what she was doing, where she was going, but she found peace in the familiar, but somehow strange throng of trees. It was like being on a mission again, or foraging for herbs and medicinal plants. There was something refreshing about being completely alone.

Sakura placed her palm against the trunk of a tree, its bark rough against her palm. She usually found satisfaction in holding something under her hand, something she could crush so easily with just a touch of chakra. Now she didn’t have enough chakra for even one punch. She wouldn’t have been able to snap this tree if she had wanted to, which also meant that she wouldn’t have been able to defend herself against an enemy should one appear.

With new apprehension, Sakura turned to glance back over her shoulder at the village behind her. There were a few scattered windows still glowing with light, but for the most part the village was dark. If she didn’t know any better, she might have assumed it was vacant – a ghost town.

The sound of twig snapping in the distance caught her attention. The hair on the back of her neck rose up and she felt her heartbeat steadily increasing until she could hear the blood rushing in her ears. Warily, she scanned the darkness, her eyes roving over each tree, each silhouette that was lit by the scant light of the moon. She saw no movement, nothing to indicate that there was a person out there.

She took a step backwards, closer to the gates. She sent a probe of chakra through the trees, searching for the presence of another shinobi, of Naruto. She sensed nothing, though, same as every other time.

“Naruto?” she called out, her voice a hoarse whisper.

A rustling of leaves drew her eyes to her right where she saw shrubbery low to the ground. The rustling stopped and Sakura kept her eyes narrowed and focused on the bush where the sound had come from. Nervously, she took another step back toward the village.

A squirrel burst through the leaves, snapping another twig as it made its way up a nearby tree. Sakura gasped and clutched at her chest, startled by the sudden movement.

“It’s just a squirrel,” she murmured to herself. “Keep it together, Sakura.”

Deciding enough was enough, Sakura turned and began walking back toward the village gates. Naruto wasn’t out here, and even if he was she would never have been able to find him. It was better to go home and try to get some sleep than to agonize over his absence in the darkness.

Feeling a little spooked, Sakura quickly made her way back to her apartment, trying to ignore the guilt nagging at her in the back of her mind. Naruto had wanted to go, she reminded herself. He wanted to help her. It had been his idea, after all. She would never have suggested that he go off on his own straight into danger. Not while he was sick, or at any other time. It was panic and desperation that had led her to make such a poor decision, and she couldn’t help but blame herself for this turn of events.

By the time she had returned home and changed into pajamas, her guilt had morphed into nausea. By now she was used to her nightly vomiting. Everyday she pushed down her urges, forced herself not to feel sick. In the privacy of her apartment, though, Sakura allowed herself to purge the day’s meager food, to let herself feel sick.

She grimaced as she rushed toward her bathroom, flinging to toilet lid up so she could retch inside. This was hell, she thought. Two of her teammates were missing. The entirety of the village was sick and depending on her while she was just as helpless as they were. She didn’t need Kabuto – she needed a miracle.

Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, Sakura slowly made her way back to her bedroom and fell unceremoniously onto her bed. If only she could crawl underneath her duvet and sleep until she wasn’t sick anymore… If only there were someone here to change her sheets and pulse healing chakra into her chest.

Too dehydrated to cry, Sakura stared blankly at her ceiling. The light of the moon cast silvery shadows around her room, which distracted her more than they should have. She couldn’t tell how long she lay sprawled there, waiting for sleep.


	4. Chapter 4

Sakura woke up to a firm hand pressed against her shoulder, shaking her roughly. On alert, but still a little delirious from sleep and sickness and exhaustion, she bolted upright and flung her covers onto the floor. Her vision was immediately filled with blonde hair and blue eyes, accompanied by the overwhelming presence of massive, familiar chakra.

“Naruto!”

She launched herself into his arms, clinging to him desperately. She realized her cheeks were already wet with tears and the relief that flooded her body felt like an impossible weight lifted off her shoulders.

“Sakura-chan, I’m so sorry,” he mumbled into her hair. She pulled back away from him to get a good look at his face. He was in better condition than she had assumed he’d be. His face was still pale and sweaty, but he didn’t look like he was succumbing to dizziness or nausea. With a surge of diagnostic chakra, she checked to see what condition he was in. Finding that he was still in relatively good health with no external injuries, Sakura pulled back her arm and slapped him across the face.

Naruto winced but otherwise allowed the contact. He rubbed the red handprint on his cheek and gave her an apologetic look.

“You’ve been gone for almost a week,” she hissed. “You could have sent me a message that you were okay! I thought you were dead. I was worried sick about you!”

“I know, Sakura-chan,” he replied consolingly. “I’m really sorry. I tracked Kabuto to a bunker near the border of River Country. It took me a couple of days to get there and I didn’t run into anyone that could have helped me send you a message.”

Sakura sat still and silent for a moment, fuming but incredibly relieved. Naruto was alive. He was okay and he was here in Konoha. Glancing to her left, she eyed her alarm clock. It was nearly three in the morning. The more rational part of her wanted to go back to sleep and to hash out this whole thing in the morning after she’d done what she could to heal herself.

But she knew that her curiosity would only keep her awake.

“Naruto, what happened with Kabuto?”

Naruto’s brow furrowed with concern and he lowered himself down until he was sitting next to her. “I tracked him down to a bunker near the river,” he began. “I thought that Sasuke might be with him, but he was alone.”

“How did you find him?”

“I started from his last known location and found clues from there,” he explained. “Remember we encountered him on that mission on our way to the Rain border?”

Sakura shook her head. She didn’t remember that at all.

“I just followed his tracks,” Naruto continued. “He didn’t hide them at all because it looked like Orochimaru went in the opposite direction.”

“I don’t understand,” Sakura said.

“I think Orochimaru and Kabuto split up with the intentions of Kabuto leading anyone following them away from Orochimaru. They didn’t want us trying to track down Sasuke again. At least that’s what I figured based on the way they split up. Kabuto basically led me straight to where he was hiding,” Naruto explained.

“So what happened when you found him?”

“He thought I was looking for Sasuke and he was all smug about him not being there,” Naruto said bitterly. “When I explained the real reason I was there, he seemed confused, but intrigued.”

“So he agreed to help us?”

“Well, not exactly…”

“Come on, Naruto, just tell me what happened,” Sakura snapped, beginning to lose her patience.

“He kept saying all this stuff about Sasuke not wanting anything to with me and him being stronger than me now and all that,” Naruto grumbled, a new fierceness in his tone that Sakura found very concerning. “He was egging me on.”

Sakura pressed her lips together, sure she wasn’t going to like what Naruto had to say next. Naruto gave her a sheepish look, and for a moment Sakura thought she would have to pry the information out of him, but then he opened his mouth to speak again.

“So I attacked him.”

“You what?”

“I couldn’t control myself,” he said defensively. “He was making me so angry I couldn’t help it.”

“So you didn’t even ask him about helping us?” Sakura shrieked.

“We discussed it,” Naruto stuttered. “Well, I explained everything to him just the way you wanted me to. I didn’t get a chance to properly ask for his help, if that’s what you mean.”

“You didn’t kill him, did you?”

“Of course not!” Naruto shouted. “What kind of fool do you think I am?”

Sakura furrowed her brow and crossed her arms over her chest. He didn’t really want to know what kind of fool she thought he was, and the longer he spoke, the angrier Sakura could feel herself getting.

“You jeopardized the last lifeline we have all over some dick measuring contest with Sasuke?” Sakura demanded. “How stupid could you be? We really needed Kabuto’s help. What are we going to do now?”

“First of all, I’m not stupid,” Naruto said harshly. Sakura nearly winced at the fierce inflection of his voice. She felt guilty, but only slightly. “Second, I didn’t jeopardize anything. I brought Kabuto back with me.”

Immediately, Sakura flung her legs over the side of the bed and got to her feet. “Where is he?” she asked, feeling a sickening combination of hope and dread and fear.

“He’s right outside the gates,” Naruto answered. “He’s kind of in bad shape right now, though, so he’s probably still unconscious.”

“Probably!”

“Even if he was awake, both of his legs are broken so he can’t get away,” Naruto said consolingly, as if something like that could console her.

“You broke his legs?” she shrieked again. “Why would Kabuto want to help us after you’ve beaten him to a pulp and dragged him here? You were supposed to convince him to help us, not turn him against us even more.”

“I’m sorry, Sakura-chan!” Naruto shouted. “It all happened so fast and I didn’t feel good. I still don’t feel good.” He crossed his arms and pouted, and Sakura could see that the days he spent outside Konoha had indeed taken a toll on him. He needed rest, a good bath, and a good bit of healing chakra.

But Sakura didn’t have time for any of that now.

“We can’t dwell on that now, Naruto,” Sakura said, her tone a little softer and her touch a little more tender as she wrapped her fingers around his wrist and pulled him toward the bedroom door. “Take me to Kabuto.”  
///

Kabuto’s body was slumped against the wall just outside the gate. He was hardly recognizable in his condition. His hair had been loosened from its usual ponytail and was tousled in his face, sticking to the open wounds where blood plastered it against his skin. His glasses were mysteriously absent and the unnatural angle of both his feet indicated that Naruto had, true to his word, broken both of his legs. He was covered in filth and blood, bruises dotting his arms, and probably his chest underneath his tunic.

With a pang of sympathy, though very small, Sakura knelt down beside him and began to funnel her healing chakra into his body. She was able to surmise immediately that Kabuto had not been infected with the disease, and that all his ailments were gifts from Naruto as far as she could tell. Quickly she dealt with the worst of his injuries, insuring that he wouldn’t die out here in the grass. When she had stopped his bleeding and sat back on her heels, she returned her attention to Naruto, who had been watching from a safe distance behind her.

“You could have killed him, you know,” she said pointedly. “He’s going to need a few days to recuperate before he can even think about helping us. At least he won’t have the strength to fight us.”

Naruto said nothing, but watched as Sakura heaved Kabuto’s limp body up onto her shoulder and began walking through the gate. Naruto ran up beside her and attempted to take Kabuto from her shoulder.

“Sakura-chan, let me carry him. He’s getting blood all over you,” he said.

“No,” she said firmly. “You’ll need your healing session soon. I want to make sure you haven’t gotten any worse. I don’t want you exerting yourself anymore.”

“But, Sakura-chan, what if he wakes up?”

“He’s not going to wake up, you dolt,” she argued. “He’s barely alive as it is. I’m going to take him to a private patient room and tend to his broken legs. You go tell Tsunade-sama what you’ve done and then I’ll meet you in her office.”

Naruto’s face fell and for a moment her looked conflicted. “Sakura-chan…”

Sakura paused, shifted Kabuto’s weight higher up onto her shoulder. She turned to give Naruto an inquisitive look and found enough apology in his wavering irises that she didn’t have the heart to snap at him again.

“It’ll be alright, Naruto,” she said softly. “I’m sorry I yelled at you. You brought Kabuto back here, which is more than I could have done by myself.”

Naruto sighed deeply and pressed his lips together. He only nodded in response, but Sakura could tell there was more he wanted to say. But whatever it was would have to wait.

///

Sakura heaved Kabuto’s body onto a cot, and she was not gentle with him. The exertion had made her nauseous and her head was pounding. The sun hadn’t even come up yet and she already knew this was going to be an unpleasant day. She wiped the sweat from her brow with the back of her wrist and glanced down at Kabuto’s unmoving body.

It seemed grossly unfair that the whole point of recruiting Kabuto was so Sakura’s life would be a little easier. Now she was going to have to expend more chakra than she had to spare on healing him. She had missed out on a few precious hours of sleep, so with exhaustion added to the mix, Sakura could safely say that today would be awful at best.

Still groggy, she pulled up a chair beside his cot and sat down, sagging her weight against the it. Internally, she let a minute amount of her chakra worm its way through her body. She would need to be more conservative with her chakra today, so she did the bare minimum she could, making sure she would have enough chakra for the rest of the day without compromising her ability to work. She wouldn’t do her best work if she was overly nauseous or sick.

When she had finished, she returned her attention to the unconscious man on the cot. She had never seen Kabuto unconscious before, and without that infuriating smirk on his face, he actually looked quite young and boyish. She resisted the urge to send a surge of chakra into his face to heal the black eye that was swollen and leaking blood down his temple. She would need that chakra later and he wasn’t even awake to feel it.

Instead, she wheeled her chair down to his lower half and began inspecting the damage Naruto had done to his legs. She grimaced as she pulled off his shinobi sandals and rolled up his pants to his calf. It was clear just by looking that his bones had been crushed. The breaks were not clean by any means. It looked like Naruto had picked the man up by his feet and slung him around with magnificent force.

“Ugh, Naruto, you never make things easy on me, do you?” she murmured to herself.

She set to work reknitting the bone, reconstructing his ankles, his feet. It was grueling work that required a lot of precision and a lot of chakra, but allowed the mind to wander.

She tried not to let her mind wander. It put her at dangerous risk of losing track of time, and she didn’t really have anything positive to let her thoughts wander to. But against her will, her thoughts went astray, and led her back to Sasuke. Often times that’s exactly where her free mind took her to – Sasuke. She didn’t like that she thought of him so much. She was certain that he didn’t think of her often, if he even thought of her at all.

But she couldn’t help but think of him after what Naruto had said. Kabuto had provoked him by bringing up Sasuke, a raw, deep wound that was nowhere close to being healed. Would he do the same to her once he had woken up? Would he throw her crush in her face like so many others had? She didn’t think she could take it – not from Kabuto who would definitely not pull his punches. It was one thing for Ino to disparagingly bring him up. It was another thing entirely for Kabuto to intentionally hurt her by bringing him up.

She hoped he wouldn’t do that. She was angry with him for doing that to Naruto. Naruto had reacted with violence, but Sakura already knew that wasn’t going to be feasible for her. Even if she found herself susceptible to his rage-inducing tactics, she couldn’t get violent with him. She needed his help, after all. Naruto had caused so much trouble already by doing this to Kabuto. She would have to find a way to run damage control, to convince Kabuto that he should help them.

It was counterintuitive, but Sakura knew what needed to be done. She needed to be nice. She needed to give him the best medical care possible. She needed to not look at him with disgust when he woke up and settled his creepy eyes on her.

As quickly as she could without sacrificing her precision, Sakura finished up healing Kabuto’s broken bones and placed both his legs in splints to keep him from moving. The last thing she needed was for him to undo all her hard work. When she glanced back up to his face, she felt a pang of sympathy for him. He was still bloody and dirty and would need a bath well before he would actually wake up to be able to take one. And unfortunately for Sakura, the only person capable of doing such a thing was her.

Or…

///

“No way!”

“You have to, Naruto, it’s your fault he can’t give himself one.”

“It’s disgusting!”

Sakura gave her teammate a dry look and tapped her toe impatiently. “I have enough to do around here as it is, and you have nothing to do,” she explained carefully in her most patronizing tone. “So you can either bathe Kabuto or you can get to work on healing the civilians.”

Naruto clenched his jaw and then glanced out the window of Tsunade’s office. She knew he would eventually relent. His heart was too big and he wouldn’t make Sakura do that on top of everything else she had to do.

“Fine,” he bit out, “but you owe me one.”

“Okay, I owe you one,” she agreed. “And since you’ve got nothing else to do, do you mind keeping an eye on him? Just to make sure he doesn’t break free and start terrorizing us while I’m working?”

“Does he really need a babysitter?” he asked. “His legs are broken. It’s not like he can do much.”

“He’s a medic-nin, you dolt,” she snapped. “You don’t know what he’s capable of. Besides, it’s not his broken legs keeping him down. It’s the blood loss. You really did quite a number on him.”

“Well, he really pissed me off.”

Sakura rolled her eyes and clucked in annoyance.

“Fine, I’ll babysit. You owe me two.”

“One and a half.”

Naruto glared at her.

///

After an exhausting day of healing, Sakura meandered her way back to Tsunade’s room to fill her in on everything that had happened that morning. She knew Naruto had spoken with her already, and if this situation had been less dire, Sakura might have skipped the meeting altogether. She sure could have used the extra sleep. But she needed Tsunade’s advice again, and she didn’t want to risk her wrath if she missed their nightly meeting.

“Sakura,” Tsunade said dryly as Sakura shut the door behind her. She was sitting on her bed per usual, but her research notes and scrolls were absent, replaced with a bowl of steaming soup.

“Tsunade-sama,” Sakura greeted. “How are you feeling today?”

Tsunade stared stonily at Sakura, clutching her soupspoon with a white-knuckled grip. “Naruto told me everything that happened with Kabuto,” she said. “So I’m to assume he’s somewhere in this building.”

“Yes, he’s got a patient room downstairs,” Sakura replied, trying not to feel unnerved by Tsunade’s ire. It wasn’t like she hadn’t known what Naruto intended to do. “Naruto is keeping an eye on him for now.”

“And you haven’t spoken to him yet?” Tsunade asked.

Sakura shook her head.

“So what do you plan on doing if Kabuto does not agree to help you?” she demanded.

“Well,” Sakura began with uncertainty. “I’m really hoping that he will agree, but should he chose not to, Naruto will help me expunge him I suppose. Naruto already beat him once so he’ll be able to do it again. As far as convincing him to help goes… I think I’m going to try the flattery route.”

“The flattery route?” Tsunade asked. “With Kabuto?”

Sakura shrugged. “He’s always had his head pretty far up his own ass,” she replied. “I think if I flatter him enough, he’ll be inclined to help. Kabuto is a sick and twisted man, but I don’t believe he’s completely heartless. Besides, if he doesn’t know anything about this disease, then he must be curious about it. Perhaps he’ll have more selfish reasons to help us.”

Tsunade frowned, but she didn’t argue. That was the best Sakura could come up with. Granted, she should have been working on a plan much sooner – she had been given five whole days while Naruto had been gone to come up with something. But she had been preoccupied and not in the best frame of mind.

Sakura nervously glanced down to her feet, ignoring the way Tsunade’s harsh look unsettled her.

“Alright,” Tsunade said after a tense moment of silence. “What’s his condition like? Naruto didn’t give me any details.”

Sakura fought the urge to roll her eyes. “Naruto beat him up pretty badly,” she explained. “Broke both of his legs above the ankle. He had some pretty severe internal bleeding that I handled, but the blood loss left him in bad shape. That’s in addition to some less severe external injuries: a black eye, a chakra burn wound on his upper torso. He’s unconscious, but I expect him to wake up sometime in the next two or three days.”

“I see,” Tsunade replied. “That will give you some time to figure out what you’re going to say to him when he wakes up.”

“Yes,” Sakura agreed. If she could spare the time, she would definitely try to write a script. For now, though, she was content to wing it.

“When he wakes up, I want to speak to him,” Tsunade said.

Sakura blinked in surprise and looked up at her mentor with wide eyes. “Are you sure you can handle that?” she asked.

Tsunade tsked with annoyance and dropped her soupspoon, letting it clatter around the bowl. “I’m sick, but I’m not an idiot,” she snapped. “You can wheel me down there when he’s awake. I want to talk to him. I’m still Hokage and I don’t like the idea of a spy and a criminal living under my roof.”

“But, Tsunade-sama, don’t you think that with your temperament and your… um, anger, that you might just deter him from wanting to help us?” Sakura asked nervously, fidgeting under Tsunade’s intense glare.

“My temperament?” she demanded, her voice raised an octave.

“Come on, shishou, you know how irritable you can get and we all know your feelings toward Kabuto and Orochimaru,” Sakura argued, taking a step backwards toward the door. “You might jeopardize things if you insult him.”

The severe scowl on Tsunade’s face told Sakura everything she needed to know about her mentor’s opinion on the matter. “It’s not up for negotiation, Sakura,” she said through clenched teeth. “When he wakes up, you will take me down there so we can have a chat. End of discussion.”

“Yes, shishou.”

///

The next morning, after a more restful night of sleep, Sakura headed straight to Kabuto’s room. Ino could wait this time – Kabuto took priority today.

Naruto was slumped against the wall in the corner when she entered, snoozing and snoring in a way that would have been comical if Sakura had been in a better mood. She flipped on the lights and watched him wake up, rousing himself out of drowsiness by yawning loudly and stretching his arms above his head until she heard his spine popping.

“Sakura-chan,” he groaned, rolling up onto his feet.

“Good morning, Naruto,” Sakura said dryly. “I see you were keeping vigilant watch over Kabuto here.”

“Come on, I still have to sleep,” he said. “I’m sick, you know.” He added in a sniffle for effect, though the disease, as far as Sakura knew, did not cause nasal congestion. Sakura gave him a withering look before she turned her attention to the unconscious man on the cot in the center of the room.

True to his word, Naruto had bathed Kabuto. He was no longer bloody or dirty, and his muddy clothes had been swapped out for a hospital gown, though perhaps a little too large for him.

“You didn’t wash his hair,” Sakura pointed out, glancing at the oily strands of hair that clung to his face and neck.

“And what, like, submerge his head?” he asked. “That seems a little stupid, don’t you think? He’s unconscious, he would drown.”

Sakura bit back a frustrated groan and rolled Kabuto’s cot toward the bathroom. If things had been different, she might have left his hair dirty. She didn’t want to wash it any more than Naruto did. But with infections and bacteria running rampant all over Konoha, she could at least do her part to keep the spread at bay.

“Fine,” she said to Naruto. “Go home and get some real rest. I’m serious. You need to be sleeping.”

“Yes, ma’am, Sakura-chan,” Naruto said, grinning like an idiot.

Sakura could only roll her eyes.

///

Sakura wasn’t quite sure what to do with Kabuto. She had monitored his vitals and checked to see if he had been infected. There was no trace of the infection in his body and he didn’t seem to show any symptoms of it.

This meant either one of two things. Either Kabuto had figured out a cure or a vaccine for the infection and implemented it on himself, or he had never been infected at all.

It was unlikely that Kabuto wouldn’t have caught the disease somewhere between Naruto capturing him and Sakura bringing him back here to the hospital. If he hadn’t been infected until he reached the gates, it would be a few days before symptoms would start. But Sakura didn’t think it wise not to take preventative measures anyway on the off chance that he had somehow managed to remain uninfected.

She was aware that this would create a lot more work for herself. She would have to make sure she always wore a mask around him, and washed her hands thoroughly before and after checking on him. She would have to use the air locked door reserved for the most severe cases of quarantine, which would add several minutes to her time with Kabuto each day, taking time away from the others in the village.

From now on, she decided, she would switch up her routine so that Kabuto was first each morning to eliminate as best she could the risk of spreading the infection to him.

With an annoyed sigh, she looked down at Kabuto’s face, her brow furrowed with irritation and exhaustion and a little confusion. He looked much younger now that he wasn’t bloody and dirty. His skin was pale, but not unnaturally so. Without his glasses, he somehow looked like a completely different person. His wet hair was loose around his face – Sakura had not taken the time to dry it or put it back up in its usual ponytail. If she hadn’t known any better, she might not have believed that the man before her was, in fact, Kabuto. He looked so wildly different, so peaceful without that smug smirk on his face.

Sakura gritted her teeth, forcing herself to believe that feeling sympathy toward the abhorrent criminal on the cot in front of her was actually a good thing. She needed him to want to help her, and he wouldn’t do that if she was as bitter and mean to him as she wanted to be.

It wasn’t in her best interest to dwell on it. She could deal with it when he woke up. She sucked in a deep, calming breath and made her way toward Ino’s room.


	5. Chapter 5

Ino wasn’t in her room when Sakura arrived. She must have grown impatient with waiting for Sakura and made her way down to the greenhouse. But when Sakura made her way down the greenhouse, she found it as empty as Ino’s room.

Sakura’s immediate inclination was to panic. Ino was far too sick too sick to be roaming around unassisted. She could be hurt somewhere for all Sakura knew.

Trying not to panic, Sakura searched through the hospital rooms on Ino’s floor. It was possible she had gone to visit one of her friends or get something to eat. Sakura peered into each room through the windows, trying to catch a glimpse of her blonde friend, but after she had searched through the entire hospital wing, she began to feel a little freaked out.

It was still early in the morning and the sun had just begun to peek up over the horizon. Sakura didn’t want to waste too much time looking for Ino when she should have been conserving her energy for healing, but she knew that if she didn’t find Ino it would haunt her all day and she wouldn’t do her best work.

So in the light of the morning sun, she walked down to the Yamanaka house to see if Ino had gone home to see her parents.

Ino wasn’t there either, but Sakura went ahead and gave quick healing sessions to her parents before she left, doing her best to keep Ino’s absence a secret. She didn’t want anyone else freaking out over it just yet.

But now Sakura was growing quite concerned. Just where could Ino have gone off to in her condition?

Deciding it was best to take this matter to Tsunade so she didn’t have to waste only her own brain energy on it, she made her way up to Tsunade’s room only to find Ino perched on the end of Tsunade’s bed, holding a lengthy scroll in her hands. Tsunade sat at the head of the bed, her head buried in a scroll of her own.

“What the hell, Ino?” Sakura demanded. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”

“Oh,” Ino said, looking up from her scroll with a bit of surprise on her face. “Yeah, I guess I should have left a note or something. I went to the greenhouse this morning when you didn’t show up for our appointment so I could get a little work done and I discovered something I wanted to share with Tsunade-sama.”

Sakura glanced up to her mentor, who merely shrugged.

“Well?” Sakura asked. “What was it?”

Ino reached down to the floor on the other side of the bed and pulled up a potted plant – a red, flowering plant that open up from a short, thick stem to a full and luscious bloom. In the center of the bloom was a small yellow bud.

“Look,” she said, pointing to the bloom. “This plant was labeled as pinsinthe abenthia. The tag claimed it has antibacterial properties. I had never seen it before because this plant grows in the dark. It was in the very back of the greenhouse in it’s own little closet thing.”

“Yes, I know,” Sakura said dryly. “I planted them there.” Sakura had forgotten all about the plant, but she had been the one to plant in the greenhouse several years ago. The first one had been a gift from Temari after Sakura had spent a few days there teaching a new wave of Sand medics. It hadn’t been until a few months later that Sakura had realized that the spores the plant released into the air contained antibacterial properties and would be a good plant to add to her arsenal. She mentally kicked herself for forgetting about it.

“Well, the spores on this thing—”

“Are antibacterial,” Sakura interrupted. “I know. I had forgotten that plant even existed since it only grows in the dark.”

Tsunade looked up from her scroll to give Sakura a disapproving look. Sakura felt a fresh wave of annoyance, though more at herself than her mentor. It wasn’t exactly unreasonable for her to have forgotten a medical plant. After all, Tsunade hadn’t remembered it either. Given that it was a foreign plant, it would have been more understandable, especially given the extenuating circumstances.

“Anyway,” Ino continued, “I brought it up to Tsunade-sama and she suggested that we infused the spores or the plant itself with healing chakra, so we’ve been up here working on that all morning.”

“And what?” Sakura asked, “An infected person will breathe it in, but that won’t necessarily cure them, especially considering that the infection isn’t respiratory.”

“Correct,” Tsunade agreed, though her tone was curt and her eyes were narrowed, “but with all the research I’ve been doing into more malleable, physical chakra, I think I might have found a way to infuse it into something that could potentially spread it throughout a body in a way that uses the body’s resources instead of the healer’s. This could be very helpful for you, Sakura. You could infuse your chakra into these plants and then allow the plants to do the work for you.”

“You mean like somehow training it to seek the bacteria on its own and eliminate it?” she asked. “That sounds too good to be true.”

“Maybe it is,” Tsunade agreed, “but we’ve got no other leads, so it’s what we’ll be working on for now.”

Sakura pressed her lips together, repressing the urge to sigh. She really wanted to believe she could do this on her own, but she knew better. She just didn’t like feeling like she was being one upped by Tsunade or Ino.

“Okay,” she said after a moment, “I guess I’ll let you get back to it. Ino, would you like a quick healing session before I leave?”

Ino shook her head, not bothering to look up from the scroll in her lap. “I’m good,” she said.

Feeling a little useless, Sakura left, letting the door fall shut behind her.

///

After his trek to the greenhouse, Sakura had hoped that Kakashi’s condition might have improved. When she entered his hospital room, it was immediately clear to her that that was not the case. Though it was late morning now and the sun beamed hotly through the window, Kakashi was once again cocooned beneath a pile of blankets. Sakura could hear his muffled snoring and sighed.

She flipped the light switch and moved to open the window to let in some fresh air. It would have been nicer if his window faced the gardens, which might have improved his condition just a little bit. Instead, his window faced the civilian district, which might as well have been a petri dish filled with disease.

But it wasn’t like Kakashi could get any worse at this point, and he seemed to enjoy the fresh air, even if it wasn’t all that fresh.

“Wake up, Kakashi-sensei,” she said, prodding the lump under the covers with a rigid finger. Said lump groaned loudly and burrowed itself deeper into the mattress, pulling the covers tighter against himself.

“Come on, Kakashi-sensei, I’ve got other patients to see today,” Sakura said impatiently.

Kakashi remained still and Sakura had a sneaking suspicion that he had fallen back asleep. Another prod with the tip of her finger with no response confirmed her suspicions. Pursing her lips in disapproval, Sakura yanked the blanket off his body and tossed it onto the floor.

The lump turned human again made a sound of surprise with the back of his throat and began to shiver dramatically, rolling over onto his back to give Sakura a look of intense consternation.

“I’ll make this quick,” she said to him, moving to sit on the foot of the bed. Wearily, Kakashi sat up, looking a bit ridiculous with his hair flying in every direction and red sleep lines from his pillow cutting across his forehead. He was once again drenched in cold sweat, and with a gentle palm to his forehead, Sakura could tell that he also had a high fever.

“You aren’t feeling so good, are you?” she asked softly, feeling a bit guilty for her abrasive wake-up tactics.

Kakashi shook his head, but luckily he did not seem to be upset with her. Sakura sent a rush of healing chakra into his body, doing her best to alleviate his symptoms before she attempted to clear any of the infection. With her other patients, she might have been more prudent with her chakra expenditure, but this was Kakashi-sensei, and her sympathy weighed far too heavy for her to leave him feeling so badly.

When she had finished, she leaned back against the foot of the bed and looked to his face, trying to gauge if he felt any better now. He hadn’t spoken a word since she’d entered the room and she wondered if he was feeling too ill to speak or if something else was wrong.

His face was still dulled by sleep. Sakura could see the bleariness still in his eyes and wondered if he was fully present enough to know what was going on.

“Kakashi?” she said softly.

He blinked a few times, and after a moment, he stretched his arms up into the air and leaned back to pop his back. Sakura watched with exasperation as he methodically popped every joint in his body capable of being popped and then plopped himself unceremoniously back onto the mattress with a heavy sigh.

“I hate feeling like this,” he mumbled quietly, more to himself than to Sakura.

“No one likes feeling sick,” Sakura said with understanding. She might not always have the best bedside manner, but she could do her best for Kakashi, especially since it seemed to appease him most of the time.

“That’s not what I meant,” he said, sitting up slowly so he could look at her face. “I feel so useless. I can feel how low your chakra signature is now and—” He glanced toward the window. “—it’s only mid morning. I wish there was something I could do to help you.”

Sakura gave him a reassuring smile. “Even if you were in perfect health, there isn’t much you’d be able to do,” she said, “except maybe keep an eye on Kabuto for me.”

“What?”

“Naruto brought him back here,” Sakura explained.

“Is he here in the hospital?”

Sakura nodded. “He’s quarantined in his own wing,” she answered. “He isn’t infected with the disease and I didn’t want to risk getting him infected.”

“So Naruto got him to agree to help?”

“Not quite,” she replied. “He dragged him back here after beating him unconscious. He hasn’t woken up yet and I doubt he’ll be too pleased in a few days when he comes to. I’m going to have to run some serious damage control.”

Kakashi gave Sakura a disapproving look and leaned closer to her. “I know you’re smart,” he said, “but you need to be very careful. You know how crafty Kabuto is.”

“I know that, Kakashi,” she said dryly, dropping the suffix from his name out of frustration. “I’m not going to be foolish about this. I have a few days to figure out exactly what it is I want to say to him. I’ll be as pragmatic as possible, and if things go south, I’ll get Naruto’s help.”

Kakashi didn’t seem mollified by this idea, but there wasn’t much that could be done about it now. Kabuto was here and he would eventually wake up. Either he would choose to help or he would choose not to, but either way it was something unavoidable on Sakura’s plate.

“I’ll help you,” Kakashi said. “I can help you figure out how to manipulate him.”

“I don’t want you to overexert yourself, Kakashi-sensei,” she said, placing a comforting hand on his arm. “You should be resting.”

“I’m constantly resting,” he argued. “This is really the least I can do. I don’t want to feel useless anymore. Besides, I’d like to know you’ve got the best possible plan before my favorite student goes traipsing around with hardened criminals.”

Sakura rolled her eyes and gave him a gentle shove. “Fine.”

///

After leaving Kakashi’s rooms, Sakura headed back to Kabuto’s. She couldn’t risk leaving him alone for any substantial length of time, because even though he wasn’t slated to wake up for a few days, she knew that with his medical caliber, it was a definite possibility that he would rouse before then.

So her plan was to execute a new seal that she had sort of invented herself. It wasn’t anything too special. Seals were not her area of expertise, though she thought she did a fairly good job of managing the yin seal on her forehead. This seal, though, was one that would connect her to the mirrored one she would place on Kabuto. It would require minimal chakra and would allow her to remotely monitor Kabuto’s vital signs. She would know instantly when he woke up, no matter how far apart they were.

Sakura had never put this seal into practice before – there had never been a need for it. But it had been a project of hers for quite some time now and she was eager to test it out on a person whose well being she wasn’t particularly interested in. If something went wrong, she wouldn’t be too heartbroken over it (though she felt a small amount of guilt for her cavalier attitude towards another human being). Still, she anticipated no ill effects of such a seal.

Kabuto was still unconscious when she reentered his room. She could see the slow rise and fall of his chest, indicating he was still alive, still breathing. She pulled up the chair beside his cot and sat down near his face. Kabuto would surely notice the seal immediately when he woke up. He would be able to sense Sakura’s chakra and the seal wherever it was placed on his body, so the location wasn’t all that important. She picked up his limp arm and turned it over so she could examine the inner part of his wrist. The skin there was thin, and if she placed it right over his pulse it might be more effective.

She probed his arm with gentle fingers, checking his pulse the old fashioned way before accumulating some chakra in the tips of her fingers and forcing it into his skin, spreading it out into a circular pattern with two prongs extending on opposite ends. Fascinated by the way her chakra bleed through his skin like ink, Sakura watched as the seal glowed brightly, warming under her touch before it faded quickly and dissipated into a black, tattoo-like image.

Finished with her work, Sakura looked back up at Kabuto’s face. His breathing was still steady and even and his face was perfectly still as if carved from stone rather than living flesh. It was slightly unnerving, but also incredibly relieving.

She turned her attention to her own wrist and began to perform the same procedure on herself. Her chakra felt hot on her skin, but not unbearable, and when she was finished, she found the resulting mark to be actually aesthetically pleasing. She watched it fade into black inkiness with a sense of accomplishment.

The effect was nearly instantaneous. She could feel Kabuto’s pulse when the seal on her wrist was, so close to her own pulse. It almost felt like the pulse was hers the way it beat against her skin. She hadn’t anticipated feeling it so strongly. With a surge of chakra into the seal, she tested to see whether she could properly monitor his other vitals. With a bit of exploration, she was able to find his blood pressure, body temperature, and respiratory rate.

Sakura leaned back against the back of her chair, feeling more accomplished than she had for weeks. It may not have been progress towards the cure or a vaccine, but it was a new and successful jutsu she could add to her medical arsenal. It could prove to be quite handy on missions or extreme medical scenarios.

She glanced back up at Kabuto’s face and couldn’t help but smile. At least now she could rest a little easier at night knowing she’d be alerted when he woke up. Naruto wouldn’t have to monitor him anymore, either, which he would certainly be grateful for.

And that also meant Sakura could monitor Kabuto’s condition without actually having to see him in person. As long as his vitals were fine, she wouldn’t have to check on him more than once a day. The rate at which he was recovering was quick, but not so quick that Sakura believed he might have a hand in it himself.

Feeling satisfied with her work, and rejuvenated by her small progression, Sakura made her way out of the quarantine wing to finish her rounds for the day.

///

After finishing up in the civilian district, Sakura bypassed her nightly meeting with Tsunade and went straight for Kakashi’s room instead. She hadn’t told Tsunade about the seal yet, and though she planned to she was a bit worried about how she might react. It probably was less than prudent of her to tie herself via chakra to an enemy shinobi. It was a good way to circumvent the problem of having someone constantly surveilling Kabuto, but it opened up its own host of problems for her to have a chakra tie of this nature with him.

Since Kakashi had been gracious enough to offer his help with Kabuto, Sakura thought he would be a great place to start figuring out what she would do when he woke up.

“Good evening, Kakashi-sensei,” she said as she entered the room and shut the door behind her. “Feeling up for a little chat?”

Kakashi was propped up on the headboard of his bed, his face buried in what Sakura presumed was a book pornographic in nature. “Ah, Sakura,” he said, snapping the book shut and tossing it underneath the bed with speed less than desirable for such a high ranking shinobi. “I didn’t expect to see you again today.”

“I was hoping I could take you up on that offer for help with Kabuto,” she said, moving to sit beside his head. Instinctively, she reached her hand toward his chest, aiming to surge his chakra into his system, but she pulled her hand back abruptly, feeling a bit strange to be off her usually routine.

“Sure,” he said, grinning beneath his mask.

“Okay, good, because I may have already fucked up.”

Kakashi raised a brow, his eyes wide with immediate concern.

“Well, sort of,” she amended. “Maybe. I don’t know. I placed a seal on him that will allow me to remotely monitor his vitals.”

“Sounds smart to me,” Kakashi said, “but are there adverse effects of the seal?”

“I’m not going to know until he wakes up,” she admitted. “To be honest, I wasn’t sure that I wanted to use the seal on him at all until I realized that otherwise I would have to have Naruto constantly watching over him. I really didn’t want Naruto to be the first person he encounters when he wakes up after what happened, and I kind of need Naruto elsewhere. I admit I didn’t think this all the way through. I just kind of… did it.”

“Will Kabuto realize that he has a seal on him when he wakes up?” Kakashi asked.

“I’m sure he will,” she replied. “He’ll be able to see if because it’s on his wrist, but he’ll be able to feel it as well. It’s benign, so he might not be angry about it, but he’ll certainly not actively want it either.”

“Perhaps it would be best to offer to remove it immediately when he wakes up,” Kakashi advised.

“I probably won’t do that until he agrees to help us,” she said. “Even then, I’m not sure I can trust him. But we’ll see.”

“I’m not sure we’ll come to a place where trust can be shared with Kabuto,” Kakashi warned. “You’re soft hearted, Sakura, and I know how easily people can get close to you. Don’t let Kabuto take advantage of your niceness. The best you can hope for is a peaceful coexistence, but don’t delude yourself into thinking that Kabuto is trustworthy, no matter what he says to you.”

Sakura scowled and crossed her arms defensively over her chest. “I’m not an idiot, Kakashi,” she bit. “I know not to trust him. If anything, the goal is to get him to trust me, to let his guard down. We may be in desperate need of his help with this disease, but it’s not the only thing I want from him. He knows things about Orochimaru and Sasuke that we need to know.”

“If you bring them up to him, it’ll make him suspicious,” Kakashi said. “It’s best to wait until you’ve gotten all the help from him you need before you bring up Sasuke or Orochimaru.”

Sakura’s scowl deepened. “I’m not stupid.”

“I know that,” Kakashi said, his tone patient and too gentle for Sakura’s petulance. “It’s just that if things go south, you’ll be alone with an entire village to defend. I just want to make sure everything goes as smoothly as possible for you.”

“Okay, okay,” she conceded. “What should I say to Kabuto when he wakes up?” she asked, diverting her attention back to the main topic at hand.

“Kabuto’s willingness to do something is directly related to how beneficial it is to him,” Kakashi said. “Is there something you can offer to him? Something that he really wants in exchange for his help?”

Sakura shook her head with a dejected sigh. “If there was something he wanted from me, I’m not sure it would be something I’d want to give,” she said. “And any medical expertise I could offer is likely nothing he doesn’t already know.”

“Then my suggestion is to ask him what he wants,” Kakashi replied. “Perhaps you two can come to an agreement.”

Sakura shifted herself away from him, angling her head toward the door. “Do you think I made a mistake asking Naruto to bring him here?” she asked softly, not daring to meet his eyes. She wasn’t really sure she wanted to hear his answer, either. She didn’t need the confirmation that what she had done was dangerous and stupid. If the risk to Naruto hadn’t been enough, there was now a well known, wanted criminal just one floor above them, comatose and likely to be enraged when he awoke.

“There’s no point in thinking about that now,” Kakashi said. “But I have no doubt that you will be able to get Konoha through this. Kabuto isn’t more than you can handle. Give yourself some credit.”

“No offense, Kakashi-sensei, but Kabuto is really the last person I would want to fight,” she admitted. “He would know more about protecting himself from any offensive medical jutsu better than any other person I know.”

“Then don’t use medical jutsu against him,” Kakashi suggested. “Ideally you won’t be fighting him at all, but if you have to, maybe you should stick to that immense strength of yours. Kabuto is fast, but he also has fairly low stamina. You could easily tire him out before you hit your limit. It’s nothing but a waiting game.”

“Okay,” she conceded. “So, my plan is to offer to help him or give him something he wants in exchange for help here in Konoha. If he refuses… then I guess I just let him go unless he wants to fight me, in which case I will attempt to get as far away from the hospital as possible to minimize damage and then beat him, I guess.”

“That’s the spirit,” Kakashi said with an eye-crinkling grin, “and don’t forget about Naruto. He beat up Kabuto once. He can do it again.”

“Right, right,” Sakura murmured. “I forgot about Naruto.”

“Speaking of,” Kakashi said. “You should send Naruto my way if you see him today. I need to have a little chat with him.”

Sakura raised an inquiring brow, looking back at her teacher over her shoulder.

“Don’t be nosey, Sakura,” he admonished. “It’s not becoming of a young lady.”

Sakura sent him a wry glare and moved over to his window, which she slammed shut with just enough sass to display her thoughts of that statement.

“Fine,” she said curtly. “If I see Naruto, I will send him your way.”

Kakashi grinned again, but Sakura wasn’t in the mood to grin back.


End file.
